TOKYO: Goro Hasegawa, the Japanese man who created the board game Othello, has died. He was 83.

Hasegawa died after a long illness Monday in his home in Kashiwa, a Tokyo suburb, said Marie Kimura of the Japan Othello Association, while declining to specify the illness.

Hasegawa came up with the idea for the game as a child, when he played with milk-bottle caps. He proposed it to a manufacturer as an adult in 1972.

His father, an English literature expert, was behind the name, inspired by Shakespeare's play because the game uses round pieces — black on one side, white on the other.

Since in 1973, 24.75 million Othello sets have been shipped in Japan, not counting online or overseas sales, according to Tokyo-based MegaHouse Corp., which makes Othello.